


7 Years

by orphan_account



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, The Fosters (TV 2013)
Genre: F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-10-07
Updated: 2016-10-26
Packaged: 2018-08-20 02:17:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 16,424
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8232601
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Follow five kids as they make their way through Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.





	1. Hogwarts

“Come on!” Jesus Adams-Foster called excitedly to the rest of his family.

“Jesus, calm down. The trains not supposed to leave for another twenty minutes.” Stef chastised her son.

“But, mom!”

“Jesus your mother is right. There’s no rush.” Lena interjected, rolling her eyes.

A group of seven people, four teenagers and two middle aged women, walked briskly through Kings Cross Station. They were an odd sight to say the least. Pushing along heavy trunks with three owls and a cat the Adams-Foster family were looked upon with great interest by the muggle passers-by. They ignored the looks, however.

They made their way to the usual entrance in the divide between platforms nine and ten. The family had been coming here ever since Brandon, who was now a fifth year, had embarked upon the train.

One by one the family entered platform nine and three quarters. Jude had been here before to see all his siblings off, always desperate to go himself, and now he was. He took it in, all the odd sights and sounds and smells you’d not find anywhere else. The awkward, slightly scared looks of muggle parents sending off their muggle born offspring; friends greeting each other and sharing summer stories; tearful farewells and much, much more.

And then, of course, the train itself. It was magnificent. It stood there in its scarlet-clad glory, the sun glinting brightly off its polished body. The faint, grey smoke that emitted from its black chimney wafted lightly up and danced among the clouds. Jude could already hear the engines at work loudly. The rather unattractive clangs and bangs just seemed to add to its character. Jude grinned. He was finally going to Hogwarts.

“I can’t believe it’s finally happening!” Lena said, sadly.

“What?” asked Brandon, confusedly.

“You’ll all be gone! It will just be me and mama.” Stef explained turning a sad eye on Jude. “I’ll miss you, Judicorn.”

“Don’t call me that.” Jude moaned even though he quite liked it.

“And you lot better take care of him.” Stef said sternly to her other four kids. Brandon, Callie and Mariana nodded seriously while Jesus rolled his eyes. “I’m serious Jesus! If you-”

“Its fine, mom.” Jude reassured. He was grateful that his moms cared but he didn’t want to be treated like a baby. Stef looked unconvinced but Lena took her wives hand.

“Jude will be fine, Stef. Just like the others were.” Stef nodded at her wife’s words.

“I should probably get going. I’ve got to patrol the train.” Brandon said.

“Yeah, yeah you high and mighty prefects are too good for the plebeian likes of us, we get it.” Jesus smirked.

“Jesus, stop!” Lena scolded. “That’s fine, honey. Have a great term; we’ll see you at Christmas.” Brandon hugged both Lena and Stef, then was gone, hurrying on to the train.

“The rest of you should probably get going soon to.” Stef said.

Jesus nodded. “I’m to go find my friends. I’ll write. See ya!” Then, after a brief hug with his parents, he ran off to find fellow third year Gryffindor’s.

 Mariana gave a slightly longer hug to Stef and Lena and also excited for the train but not before also hugging Jude and telling him good luck, which Jude was grateful for. Callie also said goodbye to the moms but held back rather than going on the train to talk to Jude.

“Well good luck Jude. Your will do great, I just know it!” Lena smiled and hugged her youngest son with an eye full of tears.

“Remember it doesn’t matter what house you are in, we will love you just the same.” Stef reminded him while she hugged Jude as well. “Don’t forget to make plenty of friends.”

He waved to them as he and Callie stepped on the train. “Bye!” He called as the conductors whistle sounded. Callie turned to him.

“Do you want me to stay with you to look for a compartment?”

“No. I think I can manage.” He was glad that she cared for him but this was something he felt he had to do on his own. She nodded in understanding.

“Don’t worry it will all be fine.” She grinned at him and started to make her way down the train in search of her friends.

And then he was left on his own as the train started to move away from the platform. What the hell did he do now?

He looked into the nearest compartment. In it sat a boy with light brown hair staring out the window with an expression Jude couldn’t quite place. He looked young, probably a first year like Jude. He also didn’t have any house colours, Jude noticed, which further confirmed this. He had broad shoulder and was likely a few inches taller than Jude, he guessed.

Jude took a deep breath and knocked on the compartment door.

                                                            ***

Rose and Albus had quickly been abounded by their cousins and siblings. They were left to walk along the train to search for suitable seats. Rose strode purposefully head held high where as Albus walked more tentatively and carefully.

Albus had always been more shy than his cousin and best friend. While Rose joined in with the Potter-Weasley-Longbottom-Lupin-Scamander quidditch games, you were more likely to find Albus in a back room devouring a good book. Aunt Hermione would always lend him excellent reads which he would read late into the night from about the age of six. He was pretty smart. Maybe even very smart. He knew this. But then again all those books he had read instead of running around the garden of the burrow like a loon (which the rest of his family had done) had to account for something. He was by no means, however, anti-social. He could, laugh and joke along with the rest but compared to most Weasleys he was quiet.

He kept a good relationship with all his family despite his bookish nature. Through all he had read and the knowledge that he had accumulated over the years of reading he was cleverer than most sixth years. His family had figured this out early on and started coming to him for help with revision and homework. During the school year he had received many a letter from his cousins or older brother asking for help that even seventh year Ravenclaws often couldn’t give. They had all come to respect him in different ways to how they respected the steadfast, brave Rose.

Suddenly a small blonde haired boy was thrown out of one of the compartments into his and Rose’s path, interrupting his thoughts. He landed with a small thud in a heap in front of Rose.

“Get outta here, Malfoy scum!” snarled a heavy set, raven haired boy who looked to be a sixth or seventh year.

“What’s going on here?” Rose asked furiously, ever the hero.

“What’s it to you, first year?” smirked the boy. Before Rose could answer, however, the boy retreated back into the compartment and slammed the door behind him. Peering into the compartment he could see about four or five boys all laughing cruelly at the entertainment they had just witnessed.

Albus decided to ignore them and turned his attention to the boy who had been thrown out. He had a pointed, shallow look to his pale face.

“Are you okay?” asked Rose, concerned. The Malfoy boy nodded meekly and smiled up at them. Rose offered him a hand to help him up.

“Thank you.”

“My name’s Rose. Rose Weasley.” Rose held out her hand which Malfoy took.

“My names-”

“Scorpius Malfoy.” Albus answered for him. Scorpius raised an eyebrow and Rose looked confused. Albus shrugged. “I remember dad and uncle Ron talking about Draco Malfoy’s son and you have the Malfoy look so…”

Rose shook her head. “Never miss a trick do you?” Albus blushed.

“I’m Albus Potter.” He said to Scorpius. They also shook hands.

“I thought you must have been a Weasely. Red hair.” He said to Rose.

“Does your dad talk about our parents?” Albus asked interestedly.

“A little. Mostly he just says they used to not get on.” Scorpius replied.

“From what I hear ‘not get on’ is putting it mildly.” Rose said.

“Yes… well… do you maybe want to look for a compartment?” Scorpius asked hopefully. Albus and Rose nodded, grinning and together the three of them took off down the train talking animatedly about the upcoming term as they went.

                                                            ***

“Can I come in?” Jude asked the brown haired boy. He looked at him and nodded quietly.

Jude smiled at him and the boy smiled back. “My name’s Connor.” The boy said.

“Jude Adams Foster. Nice to meet you, Connor.” Jude replied politely as Mama had taught him. Connor was about to say something else but before he could, the compartment door slid open. It revealed three people; a tall girl with flaming orange hair, who had opened the compartment; a grinning blonde boy; and a black haired boy who stood at the back of the threesome.

The redhead sat down next to Connor and beamed at the them. “I’m Rose Weasley. What’re your names?” Connor looked a little taken aback but Jude answered eagerly.

“I’m Jude Adams Foster. This is Connor…”

“Stevens.” Connor supplied.

Rose grinned. “This is my cousin Albus Potter.” Jude and Connor both raised their eyebrows at Albus’ last name as Rose pointed at the black haired boy. “And this is Scorpius Malfoy. We just met him.” Scorpius waved and sat down next Jude confidently. Albus was more hesitant as he took a place next to Rose.

“Are you first years too?” Rose asked.

Jude and Connor nodded. “What house do you reckon you will be in?” asked Scorpius to the group at large.

“Gryffindor.” Answered Rose immediately.

“Is that where most of your family are?” Jude asked. He already knew the answer though; the Potters and Weasleys were famous in and outside the walls of Hogwarts.

“Yeah though not all. Victoire, Louis and Molly are in Hufflepuff.” Rose said. “But James, Fred, Roxanne, Dominique and Lucy are all in Gryffindor. So was Teddy before he graduated.”

“Is your brother Jesus?” Albus suddenly asked Jude.

“Yeah.”

“Oh… he’s James’ best friend.” Jude nodded. The whole family had been quite excited when they found out Jesus had become friends with Harry Potter’s son.

“So he’s in Gryffindor like James?” Rose asked.

“Yeah and his twin, Mariana, is in Ravenclaw. They are third years. Brandon is a Hufflepuff prefect in fifth year and then there is Callie, who is a fourth year Gryffindor. She’s the only one who I’m related by blood with.”

“Why?” Scorpius questioned.

“We are all adopted apart from Brandon who my mom had with a guy before she met mama. I’ve two moms and you can’t get kids that way.” They all laughed.

“So Rose thinks she’ll be a Gryffindor-”

“I know I’ll be a Gryffindor.”

“Okay Rose _knows_ she’ll be a Gryffindor, what about you Connor?” Scorpius asked.

“Er… well my dad was a Slytherin but my mom is a muggle so I don’t really know…” Connor shrugged.

“Jude?”

“I’d be happy with anything that wasn’t Slytherin.” He said simply.

“Haven’t all your ancestors been in Slytherin?” Albus asked Scorpius.

“Yeah but dad said he didn’t care. He said we need to promote house unity now that the war is over.”

“That’s what my dad said too.” Albus said, thoughtfully.

“Well?” Rose said to her cousin, impatiently.

“What?”

She rolled her eyes. “What house do you think you’ll be in? We’ve all said. Honestly I thought you were intelligent.”

“Oh… Ravenclaw or Gryffindor, I suppose.”

“Ravenclaw?” Connor cocked an eyebrow.

“I like books.” Albus said meekly.

“Oh Albus, stop being modest. He’s cleverer than pretty much all of our cousins, even though they’ve had several years of schooling.” Rose informed the other four, as Albus looked away not meeting their eyes.

“I wonder if Alice is around.”Albus said, changing the subject.

“Don’t know. She’s probably sitting with Frank.” Rose replied.

“Who are Alice and Frank?” Scorpius asked.

“Family friends.” Rose replied. “Frank’s a fourth year Gryffindor. Alice is starting this year like us.”

“They’re Neville Longbottom’s children.” Albus informed the others.

“Who?” asked Connor.

“He fought in the war. The one who killed the snake, right?” Scorpius said.

“Yeah, though now he’s a professor. He’ll be teaching us herbology.” Rose said and turned to Albus. “It will be weird treating him like a professor, don’t you think?”

“Yeah.” Albus agreed thinking of how he’d have to refer to the man he’d known since he was born as ‘sir’.

“Anything from the trolley, dears?” An old woman pushing a trolley full of different coloured sweets had appeared outside their door. Rose, Scorpius and Jude all leaped up to get their hands on an assortment of chocolate frogs, every flavour beans, pumpkin cakes and more.

                                                                        ***

Many, many hours later their compartment was full of sweet packets and laughing adolescents. They were all dressed in their robes already and all five of them were snorting and giggling, listening to Jude’s story.

“… and then Jesus runs in with Emma _and_ Lexi and they all fall other as well. So my moms, Jesus, Lexi, Emma and Marianna are all in a heap on the floor. So me and Callie just stand there, with no idea what’s going on. And then… Brandon walks in with this superior look because he’d just been made prefect on his face and he falls over too!” They all collapsed with laughter.

Much of the train journey had been spent this way. Swapping childhood stories, worrying over the school year and sorting, wondering what different classes were like and that sort of thing. Jude, Rose and Albus seemed to have the best knowledge due to their siblings and cousins but Connor and Scorpius had been told by their dads what it was like, so they had some idea.

Finally, long after the sun at set, the train pulled into Hogsmeade station. The small group hopped off the train, leaving their luggage to be taken to the castle later. They looked at each other, unsure of what to do as they saw older students heading down a dirt path. Rose made to follow them but stopped at the sound of a booming voice sounding from the other end of the platform.

“First years! Come ‘ere first years! To me!” Rose ran towards the voice without hesitation. The rest followed more reluctantly, apart from Albus who had started grinning at the sound of the voice. Jude had heard of the gain keeper and teacher of magical creatures from his siblings so he guessed who it was. Scorpius had also heard of the man from his father which is why he was walking towards the man with great trepidation. Connor was going in mostly blind so he walked slowly but not too nervously.

“Uncle Hagrid!” Rose screeched sprinting into the outstretched arms of a huge giant of a man. He must have been ten feet tall. He had black hair, short with grey while his beard was already completely greyed. He laughed heartily and good naturedly as Rose, and soon Albus, hugged him. Scorpius, Connor, Jude and the rest of the first years all looked on bemusedly (or nervously in the case of a few kids who were scared of the size of Hagrid).

“Albus, Rose it’s good to see ya!” Hagrid said in a loud, clear voice. He patted each of them on the head and ruffled their hair, smiling. He turned to the rest of them and said, “Welcome to Hogwarts! I’m Rubeus Hagrid. I take care of the grounds and teach care of magical creatures, which I hope many of you will take in third year. Now follow me to the boats!”

He led them to the edge of a great, dark expanse of water. The lake stood in the grounds of the most beautiful building any of them had ever seen. It was enormous and magnificent with towers and battlements standing tall in the dark moonlight. The old stone walls were cracked and imperfect but strong all the same. Bright lights shone out of many of its windows lighting up the evening sky. Hogwarts castle in all its brilliance.

“Alice!” Rose suddenly called to a freckled girl with long black hair. She waved to Rose and Albus and came over to them. Albus smiled shyly at her.

“I was looking for you two on the platform but Frank made me stay with him. _So_ overprotective.” Alice rolled her eyes.

“Alice this is Jude, Connor and Scorpius.” Rose pointed each of them out.

Alice narrowed her eyes. “Scorpius Malfoy?” Scorpius nodded looking clearly uncomfortable.

“Is that a problem?” asked Connor.

“What? No! Just… surprised is all.” Alice smiled at Scorpius kindly, which he returned.

They all clambered on to a boat, and soon they were making their way towards Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. 

                                                                        ***

To say Jude was nervous would be an understatement. After they had crossed the lake they’d had a talk from Professor Longbottom, Alice’s father and head of Gryffindor house, and now they were stood in front of the entire school. He had ignored the sorting hat’s song (he was too nervous) and now he watched as Professor Longbottom held up a piece of parchment to read out the first name. He knew who it would be and sure enough…

“Adams-Foster, Jude.” Professor Longbottom called. Why did him mom’s last name have to begin with an A?

Jude could feel hundreds of eyes on him as he nervously made his way up to the stool. He sat down on and looked at his feet avoiding everybody’s eyes, especially his siblings’. Professor Longbottom placed the weathered old hat on his head and suddenly his head was filled with a gravelly voice.

_Another Adams-Foster eh? Hmmm… What to do… you have courage and brains, a certain amount of cunning._

_I’d rather not be in Slytherin._ Thought Jude.

_Yes I agree, that’s not your house. You’re not as reckless as the other two but it still better be…_

“Gryffindor!”

Jude grinned, lifted the hat off his head and ran to the cheering table. He saw Jesus and Callie yelling their approval loudly. The Gryffindor next to him clapped him on the back and Professor Longbottom had to call for silence so that he could call out the next student to be sorted.

Scorpius had clapped loudly when Jude was sorted and now he watched each sorting take place with interest. Gryffindor added another student before two Slytherins and a Ravenclaw were sorted. Then Professor Longbottom was calling out his daughter’s name.

“Longbottom, Alice.” Scorpius saw the Professor wink at his daughter as Alice took her place on the stool. A moment after the hat was placed on her head the hat shouted:

“Hufflepuff!” Professor Longbottom clapped loudly with the rest as Alice took her place at the appropriate table, looking slightly disappointed.

“Malfoy, Scorpius.” Scorpius started at the sound of his name; he’d forgotten about his own sorting, being too mixed up in Jude and Alice’s. Whispers followed him as he made his way up to the stool. His father had told him people would recognise his last name (and get negative connotations from it) but that he’d just have to ignore them. He took a deep breath as he felt the sorting hat get placed lightly on of his head.

_A Malfoy again? Your father was a Slytherin, as was your grandfather. Are you the same? I don’t know._

_I might not be Slytherin?_ Scorpius was surprised. He’d always thought he’d be in the same house as the rest of his family.

_No I don’t think your that sort. You’re not clever enough for Ravenclaw but you do have a fair bit of loyalty and kindness, so Hufflepuff wouldn’t be a bad choice. But more than that, I’m sensing an overwhelming amount of one characteristic._

_What?_

_Bravery, boy._

_So… Gryffindor?_

_Alright with that, are you? Hufflepuff would be a decent choice too._

_I think I’d prefer Gryffindor._ At least he’d be with Jude.

_Good._

“Gryffindor!”

The hall was silent. Nobody was expecting the sole son of Draco Malfoy to be anywhere other than Slytherin, especially not Gryffindor. Even Professor Longbottom seemed taken aback. Nobody moved for about five seconds and then Jude stood up from the Gryffindor table and started cheering. This seemed to spur everybody into action. The rest of the Gryffindors all began cheering loudly, while the Ravenclaws and Hufflepuffs clapped politely. Most of the Slytherins did not clap, however. As Scorpius sat down he noticed some of the older Gryffindors making rude hand gestures towards the Slytherins.

Albus wiped his sweaty hands on the front of his school robes as Orton, Jacob was made a Ravenclaw. Then the moment he had been dreading for the last three months was upon him.

“Potter, Albus.”

A hush fell over the hall. Everybody craned their necks to see Harry Potter’s second son get sorted. All of their curious eyes bored into his back.

Albus bowed his head as he made his way up to where Neville stood next to the stool. Neville gave him a small smile of comfort as he sat down but Albus hardly noticed.

 _A Pott-_ The sorting hat suddenly stopped itself as if it had suddenly noticed something. Albus’ stomach lurched. This couldn’t be good.

 _What happened? Is something wrong?_ He asked the hat, worriedly.

_Wrong? No, nothing’s wrong, boy. It’s just… your mind. It’s wondrous. The intelligence you have is… magnificent._

_Oh._

_Yes… oh. Ravenclaw for certain._

_Okay._ There was a pause. _Aren’t you going to sort me?_

_First I would like to give you a spot of advice. I have sorted some of the finest witches and wizards in the world for centuries. Ministers for magic, headmasters, even Dumbledore and none of them had the mind you do. Except one._

_Who?_

_His name was Tom Riddle. Be careful._

Albus’ mouth fell open, horrified, as the hat shouted, “Ravenclaw!” The Ravenclaw table exploded with excitement at getting a Potter. They were cheering and clapping but the Gryffindor table looked disappointed. James was clapping, as where his cousins and Jude and Scorpius too.

Albus made his way over to the table, still mulling over what the hat had told him. Was he anything like Voldemort? Was the hat trying to infer that he too would be evil? No, surely he would have been put in Slytherin if that was the case. The logical part of him (which was most of him) concluded that he must be different than Voldemort, to be put in a different house than the one Voldemort used to be in. He pushed the thought away and put on a slightly forced grin.

He sat down next to Jacob Ortega and was immediately swamped by Ravenclaws congratulating him. He decided he was happy with the hat’s choice. The Ravenclaws seemed perfectly nice, even if most of the people he knew were in Gryffindor or Hufflepuff. Ravenclaw was the house he’d always fancied when hearing about Hogwarts as a kid, anyway (though he hadn’t told his family that).

“Stevens, Connor.” Albus looked up and realised that he’d forgotten there was still a sorting taking place. Albus watched as Connor made his way up to the hat and sat down. A moment later the hat shouted:

“Hufflepuff!” Connor took off the hat and made his way to the Hufflepuff table.

After another few sortings, it was finally time for Rose. Rose strode confidently and placed herself on the stool gracefully. The hat had barely been on Rose’s head for a second before it proclaimed her as a, “Gryffindor!”

The Gryffindor table roared its approval at having another Weasley added to their midst. Rose beamed as she was greeted at the table by all of her cousins and more people Rose had never seen before.

Albus watched a little sadly as Rose was congratulated by his brother but he didn’t really mind. He knew Ravenclaw was the right place for him, even if he didn’t have any friends in the house yet. Hopefully that would become apparent sooner rather than later.

 


	2. First Day

Professor McGonagall got to her feet and spoke in a clear, powerful voice. It was obvious who the headmistress was. “Welcome to another year at Hogwarts! I’m sure it will be a year full of hard work and studying.” There were a few snorts from people around Albus. “Now, after a long journey, I’d imagine you are all hungry. So without further ado…” McGonagall waved a long, gnarled, bony hand in a swishing motion.

Before Albus appeared the most amount of food he had ever seen. Sausages, hamburgers, pies, pizza, pasta, every type of potato and more were piled on top of silver dishes. Juices, from orange to pumpkin, were also available in ornate jugs. As someone who was well accustomed to Molly Weasley’s glorious cooking, Albus new good food when he saw it. And this was definitely good food.

He grinned and began to load his plate with food. He decided to go for a Sunday lunch theme. He scooped roast potatoes, turkey, Yorkshire puddings, carrots and peas onto his plate, then poured gravy over it all, to top it off. He filled his glass with pumpkin juice, his favourite drink.

“How is this even possible?” asked Jacob Ortega next to him.

“Muggleborn?” Albus asked him. Jacob’s blank look spoke volumes. “It means that neither of your parents are wizards.”

“Oh… then yeah.” He smiled hesitantly.

“Cool. I’m Albus. Albus Potter.” Albus offered his hand to the sandy haired boy next to him.

“Jacob Ortega.” Jacob shook his hand firmly.

“To answer your question, the food is prepared by house elves below us, then transported up.”

“House elves?” Jacob’s eyes looked wide and lost, while Albus laughed.

They went back to eating for a few minutes before Jacob asked Albus the question that had been on his mind since Albus’ sorting.

“Why was there loads of whispering when your name was called?”

“Didn’t decide to read a wizarding history book when you found out you were a wizard?” Albus smiled, good-naturedly. Jacob reddened slightly.

“I picked up a few books on the topic at that book shop in Diagon Alley but I haven’t gotten around to reading them yet. I only just finished reading our textbooks on the train. Everything has been so fast.”

“Well basically my dad is Harry Potter.” Jacob seemed to recognise the name.

“I think the guy who came to take me to Diagon Alley mentioned him. He defeated some dark wizard right?”

“Yeah, Voldermort. To be honest its quite refreshing to talk with someone who doesn’t worship the ground my dad walks on.” Jacob laughed.

“Is it really that bad?”

“You have no idea.” Albus said darkly and Jacob laughed once more, his deep blue eyes filled with mirth.

Albus and Jacob spent the rest of the meal getting to know one another. Albus found out that Jacob was an only child, whose parents are rich muggle lawyers, so he was often spoilt. His parents had thought that the whole magic thing was a joke and it wasn’t until Professor Longbottom (who was the man who had taken Jacob to Diagon Alley on behalf of Hogwarts) had performed a few spells in front of them that they took it all seriously. Jacob also discussed with Albus his fears of being behind in all of the classes and his lack of knowledge of the wizarding world.

Albus in turn told Jacob about his childhood and family. Jacob was astonished at the amount of cousins Albus had and Albus pointed out each one in the great hall. He also told his new muggleborn friend about all the games he, his siblings and cousins often played. This led to a humours, as well as frustrating, conversation in which Albus attempted to explain the rules of quidditch. Although not being a talented player himself, one can hardly grow up in the Potter-Weasley family and not know the rules of quidditch. “On Broomsticks!” Jacob was still exclaiming ten minutes later, making Albus laugh so much he snorted pumpkin juice out of his nostrils.

Albus found it easy to talk Jacob. His usually shy nature didn’t necessarily disappear, but it did diminish. Jacob’s easy going disposition and general friendliness seemed to bring out conversation in Albus, he didn’t think he had.

Soon after the quidditch conversation the food disappeared and was replaced by desserts. While Jacob helped himself to a few scoops of strawberry ice cream, Albus cut himself a large slice of chocolate cake. It tasted heavenly, the strong gooey chocolate melting in his mouth. After several more bites however, he couldn’t eat anymore. He was well and truly full. He sat back and watched in amusement as Jacob messily shovelled ice cream into his mouth. He looked like a fugitive on the run, who hadn’t eaten for weeks.

“I know I’m going to be utterly rubbish!” They were back on the topic of Jacob’s worries of his abilities.

“You’re going to be fine! There are tons of muggleborns, all of whom will be in the same position as you.” Albus said in what he hoped was a comforting tone. “Plus you weren’t put in Ravenclaw for nothing.”

“What do you mean?”

Albus sighed. “No one explained the houses to you?”

Jacob shrugged. “Only that there were four houses, that’s all.”

“Each house has a preferred characteristic. Like Gryffindor’s is bravery, Slytherin is cunning and ambition, Hufflepuff is loyalty and hard work and Ravenclaw is intelligence. You can obviously have ambition and intelligence at the same time but the hat must have seen your cleverness as an overriding attribute.” Albus explained.

Before Jacob could reply, the desserts vanished and Professor McGonagall got to her feet, a little shakily. Albus wondered how old she was. She had been old even when she taught his parents, so it couldn’t be long until she retired.

“First off, a few notices.” McGonagall called into the otherwise silent hall. “Remember that the forbidden forest is… well er… forbidden. Also our caretaker Mr Ellis would like to remind you all that every single Weasley Wizards Wheezes products are banned, as well as a few others. I believe he has the full list if you are curious. We have no new teachers this year so I believe that about wraps it up. First years please follow the 5th year prefects to your house common rooms. Everybody else you know the drill. Good night!”

“Wow… what a speech.” Jacob said sarcastically and Albus smirked.

They followed Alex Ellard, the male 5th year Ravenclaw prefect, out of the Great Hall. As they were heading up the marble staircase they ran into the Gryffindor first years, who were also being led up the stairs. Albus spotted Rose, Jude and Scorpius walking together, talking. “Hey!” Rose called to him when she saw him.

“Hey. This is Jacob. Jacob this is Jude, Scorpius and my cousin Rose.” He introduced them. They all nodded their heads in greeting.

“Nice to meet you.” Rose said to Jacob, then turned to Albus again. “I knew you’d be in Ravenclaw! Looks like we better go now, though.” The Gryffindors were turning right at the top of the staircase, however the Ravenclaws were turning left.

“See you tomorrow!” Jude called to Albus as the groups separated from each other. Albus nodded and he and Jacob waved goodbye to the other three. He hoped that despite being in different houses, he could still be friends with them.

Alex led them down a long corridor and up a few flights of stairs. They passed many portraits and Jacob was astonished to see that the people and animals inside them actually moved. “I don’t think anything can surprise me anymore.” He muttered and Albus smiled. They passed great suits of armour too, standing tall like guardians of the school.

Finally Alex led them up a long winding tower to the top where he answered a short riddle given to him by the bronze eagled shaped knocker. The door swung open to reveal the Ravenclaw common room. It was wide and circular, with graceful arched windows. The straight, stone walls had blue and bronze silks hanging over them. The domed ceiling was painted with stars, which were echoed in the midnight-blue carpet. Bookcases lined the walls and tables and chairs covered the expanse of the floor. There was a large fireplace, already alight, presumably by house elves.

Alex led the boys up a set of stairs to where the boys dormitories where, whereas the girls were led up a separate set of stairs by the female 5th year prefect. After passing a few doors Alex stopped between two large wooden doors.

“There are seven of you this year, so we need two dormitories. Four of you in one dorm, three in the other dorm.” Alex said.

Albus and Jacob were both put in the same dorm, for which Albus was grateful; at least he’d be with someone he was already friendly with. Also in their dorm were a dark skinned boy and a tall brown haired boy who had a small tabby cat under one arm. Their luggage had already been brought up. The dark skinned boy introduced himself straight away.

“Hi, my name is Andrew Threshold. This is Kurt Blair, he’s my cousin.” He indicated the tall boy. Albus and Jacob also introduced themselves.

After they had all unpacked, in relative silence, Kurt held up a pack of cards. “Exploding snap?” Albus and Andrew both grinned but Jacob looked confused and Albus was reminded of the fact that Jacob was muggleborn. After explaining the differences between muggle snap and exploding snap to Jacob, the four boys spent the next hour playing and often collapsing in fits of giggles.

Finally Andrew suggested they retire to bed and the other three agreed. It was a big day tomorrow and they all wanted to be ready for it, being the organised Ravenclaws they were. Albus chaged into his pyjamas and climbed into his four poster bed. He said goodnight to all of his dorm mates and pulled the drapes around his bed.

He closed his eyes and lent back into the soft pillows, almost immediately succumbing to the lulling pull of sleep.

***

Albus woke next morning early. He warily rubbed his eyes and yawned deeply. He rolled over and closed his eyes again, however after about five minutes, he realised going back to sleep was not an option. Begrudgingly, he sat up and quietly pulled back the thick cloth drapes. He looked around and saw that Andrew and Kurt’s drapes were drawn and he imagined that they were still sleeping. Jacob’s bed, on the other hand, was empty. Albus frowned. Where could he be? Classes didn’t start for at least a few hours and he doubted that Jacob went to breakfast on his own.

He shrugged to himself and began to get ready. He had a quick shower in their bathroom and dressed in his school robes, which now magically had blue inseams and a Ravenclaw badge. He grabbed his already packed school bag and headed down to the common room to find Jacob.

He found the other boy sitting in the windowsill of a large window in the otherwise empty common room. He was dressed in his school robes like Albus and was intently looking out over the school grounds.

“You alright?” Albus asked him. Jacob looked up, startled but relaxed when he realised who the voice belonged to.

“Yeah, I just couldn’t get back to sleep. All of this is so… weird. I mean three weeks ago I was a normal kid who went to a normal school. Sure I’ve done some pretty weird things in the past, things I couldn’t explain but still. I miss my friends. I miss my parents.” Jacob fell silent, perhaps thinking he had said too much.

“Listen, I know it must be hard. I can’t imagine what it’s like; I’ve known I’m a wizard since I was like three. As for missing your parents, I miss mine too. But I know I’ll see them at Christmas and the friend’s thing…” He hesitated then decided to continue. “I’m sure we can be friends and Andrew and Kurt and Rose and Jude and Scor-“

“Okay, I get the point!” laughed Jacob. “Thanks, Albus.”

“No problem. Now I better write to my parents. I sort of forgot too, what with the excitement of yesterday.”

Jacob decided that he too would write a letter and borrow a school owl to send it, as he didn’t have one of his own. Albus owned a majestic tawny owl named Biscuit. His parents had brought him for Albus when Albus’ Hogwarts letter had come.

When they had finished writing their letters, they made their way out of the common room passing some already studying fourth years. By now more people had entered the common room from their dorms, and Albus guessed there were about twenty people there now. They excited rather ungracefully, as Jacob tripped on the first step of the staircase outside of the common room. Albus’ snort was met with a glare until Jacob, too was giggling at his own clumsiness.

They followed the map Albus’ father had given him (not the marauder’s map, unfortunately) of Hogwarts. Albus turned out to be rather adept at reading the map. After going along a few corridors and down a few flights of stairs they reached a tower that stood slightly apart from the rest of the castle. They jogged up the steps two at a time and entered the Owlery.

There were hundreds of Owls, of all different types. Tawny, barn, snowy and more flew amongst the rafters and ate out of large bowls full of food. Albus spotted Biscuit in the corner and waved to him. The owl swooped down next to him and pecked his little finger, affectionately. Albus stroked the owls back softly, smiling at his pet. He tied the letter, which mostly just outlined the train journey, the new friends he and Rose had made and his sorting into Ravnclaw, to Biscuit’s leg. He, of course, left out the Tom Riddle part.

He showed Jacob how to tie his letter to the school barn owl and together they watched the two owls disappear into the distance. “My mums gonna have a heart attack when she sees that appear at the window.” Jacob remarked when the owls had vanished from sight. Albuus grinned.

“Can’t be that bad.” Jacob rolled his eyes at that remark, but said nothing else. “Come on, let’s get to breakfast before class.” Albus said. Together they walked out of the owlery and headed in the direction of the great hall.

It wasn’t long until they reached the large room that was the great hall. The tables were already largely full as everyone got up for the first day back at school. The heads of houses were going up and down their house tables handing out the new schedules. Jacob and Albus chose a spot about halfway down the Ravenclaw table. Jacob was just buttering himself some toast, while Albus poured some milk over his cornflakes, when Rose sat down opposite them. She didn’t even bat an eyelid that she was sitting in a place she wasn’t supposed to.

“Good morning! How was your first night?”

“Great, thanks.”

“What about you?” Rose asked Jacob.

“Yeah, it was fine. I played exploding snap for the first time. Me and Albus played with Kurt and Andrew, our dorm mates.”

“Oh I’m glad your dorm mates are nice. Mine are complete cows.” Albus and Jacob snorted. “I spent most of the night in the common room with Jude and Scorp.”

“Scorp, eh? Already got a nickname for him, I see.” Albus cocked an eyebrow. Rose ignored him.

“How come you haven’t played exploding snap?” She asked Jacob.

“What was it you called me?” Jacob asked Albus.

“Muggleborn.” Albus told him.

“Oh yeah, that was it.”

“Ooh your muggleborn!” Rose exclaimed excitedly. Before she could say anymore however, Professor Flitwick arrived.

“Boys welcome to House Ravenclaw!” The little old man said excitedly. “Now here are your schedules. Good luck on your first day and try not to lose any house points.” And then he was gone, scurrying to the next group to hand out more schedules.

“Yes you’ve got charms with us first!” Rose said excitedly when she leaned over to inspect Albus’ timetable. “And transfiguration after that, we have together. But then you have Herbology, whereas I think we have History of Magic.”

At this point, Scorpius and Jude arrived and sat down either side of Rose. “Morning.” Said Scorpius as he poured himself some pumpkin juice.

“So we got charms together now?” asked Jude.

“Yeah and Transfiguration.” Jacob said.

“Coming to Hagrid’s for tea?” Rose aske Albus.

“Yeah.”

“Can I come?” asked Jacob.

“You all can.” Rose said and Scorpius and Jude nodded.

“Have you written to your parents yet?” Rose asked Albus.

“Yeah, I just sent it this morning.”

“How?” asked Scorpius.

“My owl, Biscuit.”

“So you went to the owlery?”

“Yeah, why?”

“How’d you get there? We got lost five times coming back down here for breakfast.” Jude said.

“His dad gave him a map. He’s a really good map reader.” Jacob informed the others.

“He’s good at everything.” Rose said, rolling her eyes.

“Except quidditch.” Albus muttered.

“You’re even pretty good at quidditch! You just don’t blow everyone out of the water like you do with intellectual stuff.”

“Shall we head to charms?” Jacob interrupted the developing argument.

“Sounds good to me.” Said Scorpius.

“Hang on a sec.” muttered Jude, who got up and walked over to the Hufflepuff table.

“What’s he doing?” wondered Rose, aloud.

Jude made his way to the end of the Hufflepuff table and stopped beside the figure of a brown haired boy eating alone. Jude sat down, startling the boy.

“Hey Connor.”

“Oh! Hey Jude.”

“Good first night?”

Connor shrugged. “It was alright. I wish I was in the same house as you lot, though.”

“Doesn’t matter. We still have some classes together and we can spend time out of class with each other.” Connor nodded in agreement. “Talking of which we are all heading down to Hagrid’s hut after last period.”

“We?”

“Me, Scorpius, Rose, Albus and Albus’ Ravenclaw friend Jacob. Hagrid is a friend of Albus and Rose’s, apparently. Anyway, you in?”

“Sure.”

“Cool see you then. You can head down with Albus and Jacob, looks like you have last period with them.” And with that Jude excited.

He headed back towards the group huddled halfway down the Ravenclaw table. “I invited Connor to Hagrid’s, I hope you don’t mind.” He told Rose.

“Fine with me, the more the merrier!” Rose replied, enthusiastically, making everybody else smile.

“Now, can we head to Charms?” asked Scorpius. The rest nodded, picked up their bags and headed out of the great hall together.

***

Charms was taught by Professor Flitwick in a large classroom on the 2nd floor. Thanks to Albus’ map the five kids found their way there relatively quickly and sat down in seats by the front. Steadily other first years streamed in, some looking around with great interest. Albus supposed that these were mostly muggleborns, or very nervous purebloods or half-bloods. After around ten minutes of waiting, tiny Professor Flitwick arrived.

The first half of the lesson was spent by Professor Flitwick explaining the safety rules and basics. Albus knew all of this of course, but he paid attention nevertheless. Rose and Scorpius both seemed to drift off into daydreaming, Albus noticed, although he sensed Jacob was enthralled with Flitwick’s words. This made sense; the muggleborn was just trying to catch up with the wizarding born children. Jude also seemed to be paying attention, though not as closely as Jacob.

“Now, let’s get started with a practical!” Flitwick suddenly announced to the class. This seemed to knock Scorpius, Rose an many other students out of their reverie. Everybody sat up, excited for actually being able to do some magic.

“I think we’ll start with the levitation charm.” Flitwick continued. “The words are Wingardium Leviosa. Remember all the safety tips, and speak clearly. You won’t believe some of the unfortunate situations, many witches and wizards have found themselves in, just for not speaking properly. The wand motion is a simple swish and flick, like so.” He demonstrated the movement gracefully. “Now, Mr Malfoy if you could hand out these out please.” He handed Scorpius a wooden box full of feathers. With a sigh Scorpius started to hand out the feathers.

Albus paired with Jacob when their feather arrived. Rose and Jude decided to pair together while Scorpius was still handing out the feathers. This left Scorpius with no partner, as he found out when he returned from his class chore.

“Oh come on, guys!” The rest laughed at his slightly shocked, and even hurt, face.

“That’s fine, Mr Malfoy, you can work with me up here at the front.” Flitwick piped up from the front, making the whole class giggle. Scorpius shot the other four a death glare (to which they replied with stuck out tongues), then half-heartedly made his way up to the front.

“Now then off you go, good luck!”

Jacob indicated for Albus to go first. Albus had already practiced the charm at home (thankfully the ministry had no idea whether the magic was coming from him or his parents) but he was still nervous. He took a deep breath and said loudly and clearly, “Wingardium Leviosa!” with the accompanying swish and flick. To his delight, though not quite surprise, the feather lightly lifted up, following his wand. It hovered about three or four feet above everybody’s heads.

“Oh excellent, Mr Potter! First time, as well, that is simply marvellous!” Flitwick exclaimed, enthusiastically.

“Of course Harry Potter’s kid can do it.” muttered someone at the back of the classroom. Albus ignored the comment, but Rose turned around and gave a very nasty look to pretty much everyone at the back. Most wilted under the fierce redhead’s gaze.

Soon enough the class finished, with only Jacob, Jude and two Ravenclaw girls being able to levitate the feather, as Albus had done. Jacob had been so astonished the first time he had done it, he nearly fell of his chair. Scorpius and Rose, however hadn’t managed to make the feather levitate, a fact Rose seemed to take to heart. Scorpius didn’t seem to mind to much, but Albus was sure that Rose would’ve been there all day, had the other four not dragged her away.

“I nearly had it!”

“No you didn’t.” Jude told her, bluntly. Rose only huffed in response.

The five headed towards the Transfiguration classroom. That lesson was all theory, to the disappointment of many. As they left Professor Stonley told them that they would start practical work soon, however. By the time that lesson finished it was more or less time for lunch.

They headed down to the great hall, then split up; Jude, Rose and Scorpius sat down at the Gryffindor table, while Jacob and Albus went towards the Ravenclaw table. They saw Andrew and Kurt sit down near the end of the table, and they both made their way to sit down next to their dorm mates. Albus, however, was stopped in his tracks by a tall Gryffindor third year.

“Little brother!” Albus’ older brother James said loudly. Albus could see Jesus, Jude’s brother, and Fred, his cousin, (James’ two best friends) standing just behind James, like bodyguards. “We haven’t had a chance to talk since the sorting.”

“Oh. Hi. This is Jacob. Jacob this is my older brother, James.” James turned to Jacob and gave him a single nod, before turning to his younger brother again.

“Congratulations!”

“What?” Albus was confused. “Didn’t you want me in Gryffindor.”

“Al, you’d have to be an idiot not to see you were a Ravenclaw through and through.” Fred interjected.

“Oh… okay, thanks.”

“See you around, Al. Don’t forget you’re my little bro, and I’ll beat anyone up if you want me to. Unless their seventh years.” James ruffled his hair and made his way to the Gryffindor table, as Jesus began taunting him on being ‘scared of seventh years’. Abus was a little put off by James calling him his ‘little bro’ but grinned anyway. That was about as nice James was going to get, so he chalked it up as a win.

On his way to the table he was also stopped by Roxanne and Lucy, both 2nd year Gryffindors, who also offered congratulations. Victoire, a seventh year, caught his eye from the Hufflepuff table and winked at him. It seemed his family were rather accepting of his Ravenclaw status, not that he’d been expecting them to not be. He and Jacob finally managed to sit down without interruptions.

“Wow, your family are so close.” Jacob observed as he took the offered cheese toasty from Kurt.

“I guess, especially as there’s so many of us. I’m on pretty great terms with all of them. And you haven’t even seen the worst of it yet.”

“What do you mean?” But Jacob’s question was answered as sonn as he asked it.

“Albus!” The shriek carried across the great hall, and many a head turned. Dominique and Molly were hurrying towards him.

“More cousins?” Jacob was incredulous.

“Yep.”

The girls pulled him into a large hug when they reached him. Despite being in different houses (Molly in Hufflepuff and Dominique in Gryffindor) the girls were the best of friends and both in 5th year.

“We heard! Ravenclaw! Of course!”

“You can help us out with even more homework, now!”

“So proud of you!”

“Well done!”

After a bit of small talk the girls jogged away, almost as fast as they came. Albus was left with Andrew, Kurt and Jacob all staring with their mouths open.

“They’re usually calmer than that… but yeah… they’re a bit mental.” Albus shrugged.

“Please tell me they’re the last of your cousins in this school.” Jacob said.

“Er… Louis is a third year Hufflepuff, I don’t think you’ve met him.”

“Of course.” Jacob said sarcastically.

After lunch Jacob, Kurt and Andrew headed out to the greenhouses for Herbology. When they entered greenhouse no.2, Albus noticed Connor already at a place by the work surface. He also saw Alice chatting with some fellow Hufflepuff girls, but decided to leave her be. Albus walked towards Connor, indicating Jacob to follow. Connor looked up and smiled at him.

“Thank god I finally have a lesson, with one of you. I felt like a right loner this morning.” Albus laughed as he sat down.

“Connor, this is Jacob, Jacob this is Connor.”

“Hey,” said Jacob.

“Hi.” Connor smiled.

“You’re coming to Hagrid’s right?” Albus asked. Connor nodded. “Cool, we’ll go down after this lesson.”

The lesson covered the fire making spell (which Albus had already mastered) and the spiky bush. Albus discovered that Neville/Professor Longbottom was a rather good teacher, even if Albus did already know must of what he told them. He managed to earn Ravenclaw 10 house points when he told the Professor that it was best to attack the spiky bush at a distance, because the spikes would retaliate to anyone in range. He sensed a small smile on Neville’s face as he answered that one. They then examined some already dead spiky bushes in the second half of the lesson.

Soon enough Herbology, too had finished. Albus realised that he had enjoyed the lessons today so much, that time had flown. Even Transfiguration, which had had no practical, Albus had immensely enjoyed. He just loved learning. Maybe that was weird.

After the lesson, Albus and Jacob waved goodbye to Andrew and Kurt, and joined Connor in a walk down to Hagrid’s hut. His small wooden cabin was situated on the edge of the Forbidden Forest. As the three boys arrived, Hagrid was finishing up a Care of Magical Creatures lesson. The two Ravenclaws and one Hufflepuff waited until Hagrid had sent, what looked like 5th years on their way, then walked up to greet him.

“Hello, Hagrid!”

“Albus, good first day?”

“Alright. This is my friend Jacob, he’s a Ravenclaw too. And that’s Connor, a Hufflepuff friend.”

“Nice to meet you.” Hagrid said to the two other boys. They both nodded in greeting. Suddenly, Rose, Scorpius and Jude had arrived. After Jude and Scorpius were introduced, Hagrid led the group into his cabin. They all sat around Hagrid’s wooden table and exchanged stories on their first day, as Hagrid poured them all tea.

Rose still hadn’t gotten over her failure, in charms. She could have gone on for hours, but the others all shut her up. Hagrid was pleased with both Albus and Rose’s sorting, and thought that they were in the right houses. He was surprised to see Scorpius in Gryffindor, and said he hoped this meant that he was different than his father had been at his age. Silently, Scorpius hoped that too.

It was nearing darkness when the group finally left Hagrid’s house, and trudged back up towards the castle. They parted ways in the entrance hall, and each made their way to their separate common rooms. The first day had ended but there were many left in his seven years, Albus knew.


	3. Birthday

The next morning Albus and Jacob headed down to breakfast with Kurt and Andrew. When the post arrived he looked up in interest. He was expecting his parents’ reply today. Sure enough, Biscuit returned in amongst the hundreds of other owls, swooping and diving in through the windows to the great hall. The majestic owl landed gracefully, between Kurt’s toast and Albus’ Weetabix. Biscuit stuck out his leg, on which a letter was attached. Albus untied it immediately.

“Your parents?” asked Kurt and Albus nodded. He ripped up the envelope and read the letter.

Dear Albus,

We are so proud of you! Congratulations on making Ravenclaw! We knew you were too smart to be in Gryffindor. Don’t think we’re disappointed you’re not in Gryffindor, we love you either way. Remember that your brother is full of crap, don’t believe everything he says.

Write back and tell us how your first day went! Lily is already missing you, as are we. She cried when we got back from the station. We’ll send you some of your favourite sweets in our next letter.

I remember my first week. Although I made my lifetime best friend, Uncle Ron, I also made an enemy. I would try to stay away from developing the latter. It can… complicate things (midnight duels and such).

We can’t wait to see you and James at Christmas!

Love

Mum & Dad

Albus finished reading with a smile. He had known his parents wouldn’t care about his sorting, but it still felt nice to see it in writing. He looked up and saw Jacob reading his own letter, from his parents.

“What did your parents say?” Albus asked Jacob, once the other boy had looked up.

“Nothing really, ‘we miss you’ and all that. Yours?”

“Same. Come on, let’s get to class.”

Over the next week or so Albus got a taste for every one of his classes; he loved all of them. Whether it was practical based or just copying from textbooks, he took in as much knowledge as possible. Most of the other students, including his friends, loved a few lessons, liked some and hated one or two. He, however, found that he had a taste for learning in general and looked forward to every lesson. It also helped that he seemed to be top in the class in almost everything.

There was Transfiguration with the head of Slytherin house, Professor Stonely. After a couple of lessons full of theory only work, they moved on to turning buttons into pebbles. Albus did it 25 minutes before anyone else in the class, and before the end of the class Stonley had him turning books into pillows. Stonely set a moderate amount of homework, though not too much. The most he had set was a 6 inch essay on the theory behind the basics of transfiguration, on which Albus got full marks.

Charms was one of the harder subjects, and many of the class had still not mastered the levitation charm within the first few lessons. However, Professor Flitwick kept faith and most had it after the first week, including all of Albus’ friends. By the time the last of the class had finally properly levitated the feathers, Albus was levitating tables.

Herbology was a subject that Neville had drilled into Albus from a young age in his family visits, and Albus excelled in that too. Neville was the head of Gryffindor house, but never hesitated to give house points to Albus and often Jacob too, who turned out to be rather gifted in all of the subjects, but Herbology most of all. Albus loved to hear about the different plants ad it turned out Neville was an excellent teacher.

Astronomy was fascinating, staying up late into the night gazing through long telescopes to view the midnight heavens. Observing the different planets and stars always kept Albus’ interest, despite having to listen to Rose’s grumbles as she hated the subject. She found Professor Fagan boring and didn’t understand why on earth they had to stay up so late. It mattered not, how many times Albus told her that Professor Fagan was interesting, or that it was astronomy so of course you have to study it in the night time.

By far the most boring lesson for most students, was History of Magic. Albus, though, found it stimulating and interesting. Goblin rebellions, magical wars and Lord Voldemort’s rise and fall were all on the curriculum and they were all fascinating topics, that he thought should interest everybody else more. Even Jacob and Jude, who were usually try-hards with him, rolled their eyes as he made notes on the subject, or worked for a long time on a piece of homework. He did, however, concede that the ghost that taught them, Professor Bins, was a huge bore, but he found that the library books on magic history were a much better way to learn, than one of Bins’ dull lectures.

Defence against the dark arts (or DADA) was the subject that everyone had expected Albus to do well in. As the son of Lord Voldemort’s destroyer, he was expected to do well in DADA. Luckily, as with the other subjects, he found himself well ahead of his classmates in terms of ability and work ethic. He had spent nearly two hours perfecting his first DADA homework essay, due to the stress of being expected to do well because of his father. DADA was also extremely fun. Although they hadn’t started duelling yet, they had started learning a hex or two and a shield spell (which were awfully fun to practice). DADA was taught by Professor Thomas (who had also gone to school with his parents) who was firm but fair. He had given Rose, Jude and Scorpius detention when they arrived to their lesson late (though Albus hadn’t witnessed it, since the Raveclaw’s didn’t have DADA with the Gryffindors). He was still hearing about this incident, several days after it had happened.

Potions was taught by the head of Hufflepuff, Professor Garale, a kind-faced, slightly chubby middle-aged man with balding grey hair. He was a decent teacher, but many grumbled about him, due to the fact that he set the most amount of homework. Albus didn’t mind, of course; the work was easy. His was not a popular opinion, though so he kept silent about it. Garale had been very impressed with Albus’ cure for boils potion, which he had declared the best he’d ever seen, and stated that he couldn’t have done better himself so perhaps that was why Albus had a soft spot for him.

The only lesson that Albus didn’t decimate the field in was flying. He was still good at it, the broomstick went straight into his hand when he called, “Up!” and he was fine in the air going at a steady pace, as he had been flying all his life. Connor seemed like a natural born flyer as Albus

witnessed as the Ravenclaw’s learned with the Hufflepuffs. He dived, ducked and spun around in the air and Albus could see that even Professor Friedrechs, the old wizened witch who taught flying, was impressed. Alice, too, who was in their lesson was an excellent flyer which Albus had become accustomed to since they were six and she and Rose would wiz around in the back garden of the burrow. Jacob, on the other hand was useless. He couldn’t get the broom to come to him, and he could only hover a few feet above the ground before he got to scared. The rest gave him crap about that for four days straight.

Albus heard from Rose that both Scorpius and Jude had also been talented flyers in their flying lesson. Albus already knew that Rose was an amazing flyer and would probably try out for the Gryffindor team next year. Scorpius and Connor had also expressed interest in joining their house teams, but Jude and Albus, while decent flyers, were not particularly interested in playing the game, despite Jude’s sister Callie, and brother, Jesus were both on the Gryffindor team, Callie as a chaser and Jesus as a beater. Albus too had relatives on house teams; James had been made seeker for Gryffindor just this year, Fred was the other beater beside Jesus on the Gryffindor team and Molly was a chaser on the Hufflepuff team. Jacob knew he was never getting on any house team.

By far Albus’ favourite place In Hogwarts, was the library. He loved the dusty tomes and thick, heavy books, which the library was full of. Whether it was to help with a particular essay or other piece of homework, or just for a tad of light reading on the side, he would often spend hours delving into the depths of a fascinating volume. Sometimes he would be joined by Jacob or Jude; Scorpius and Rose refused to go anywhere near the place, and the one time Connor had, he’d fallen asleep. Albus had made it his mission to get through as many books as possible in his seven year Hogwarts career. There were thousands of books in the library and he wasn’t sure how many he’d get through, but he reckoned he could get through about half.

One early friday evening, two weeks into the school year Albus found himself browsing the shelves for his latest read. The rest were at dinner or working on homework that Albus had already done, so he was alone. He picked up a book on magical relations between Russia and the United States in the years 1945-1991, and another one on the mass media’s influence on past ministers for magic before heading to a nearby table to get himself started on one of the books.

Suddenly, he heard an outbreak of giggling and he looked over to a table a few meters away. There were about five girls, all first years, sat there. They seemed to be a mixture of Hufflepuffs and Gryffindors and Albus spotted Alice in their midst, laughing along with everyone else. Albus sighed. He hadn’t spoken once to his old friend since they’d started school. She had quickly asserted herself into the popular group of girls who cared more about how they looked than anything else. Albus didn’t find any of them particularly mean but they just didn’t have anything in common.

And it wasn’t that they were popular, indeed Albus’ group of friends were also popular. With two children of the Potter-Weasley gang, they got looks wherever they went and other first years often came up to them, some trying to get into their friendship group.

Albus closed his book, coming to the terms with the fact he wasn’t getting up to much reading next to this group, and exited to return to the quiet of the Ravenclaw common room.

He got to the entrance of the Ravenclaw common room and the bronze knocker asked him, “What belongs to you but others use it more than you do?”

“Your name.” Albus answered almost immediately. The door swung open.

He entered the common room and spotted Jacob pouring over their latest potions essay, in the corner of the room. He made his way over to him, sidestepping a group of arguing second years. Luckily they were shut up by a few older students. That was the advantage of being a Ravenclaw; everyone wanted quiet so they could study.

“How’s it going?” he asked after he sat down next to his friend.

“Nearly finished, it was pretty easy.” It was clear to see why Jacob was placed into Ravenclaw. He had almost immediately showed an affinity to magic. Although not as talented as Albus, he was still at the top of the class in almost everything.

“Yeah, it was. He practically gave us the answers in the lesson.” Jacob hummed in agreement.

“Find any good books?” Of all his friends Jacob was the most understanding of his near obsession with reading.

“Yeah, I got two.” He held them up so Jacob could see.

“Oh! Did you hear about the new Hufflepuff seeker?”

“Er… no. Since when did you care about the house quidditch teams?”

“Rose told me.” Jacob said simply. “It’s Alice Longbottom.” Albus did a double take.

“But she’s a first year like us!”

“I know but she must have done better than anybody else. We saw her in Flying, she was bloody brilliant. Aren’t you like family friends or something?”

“Oh… yeah, Professor Longbottom’s actually my godfather.”

“Right. Anyway, can you check through my essay, make sure I didn’t get anything wrong?”

“Sure.”

Albus checked through Jacob’s essay, in a rather distracted manner, as he pondered the new developments. He supposed Alice was good enough to make the team in her first year but nobody had done that since… well his dad. She had looked very happy when he saw her earlier so now he guessed he knew why. He recalled a summer day before he went to Hogwarts when he, Alice and Rose had laid in Rose’s bedroom and gossiped over which houses they wanted to be in. He guessed those days were over.

The next morning, after breakfast Albus and Jacob, headed down to the lake to meet Jude, Scorpius, Rose and Connor. They found the other four under an oak tree a few meters away from the edge of the lake. Jude and Scorpius looked to be doing homework, while Rose and Connor were focused on what looked like a fierce game of wizard’s chess. The scattering mess of white and black stone

showed both sides had taken heavy casualties. It was a warm morning and many other students were littered around the grassy banks beside the great mass of water that was the black lake, enjoying the weather.

Albus sat himself down next to Scorpius, while Jacob sat beside the ongoing chess game and watched it intently. Albus took out the book on wizarding relations between Russia and the US (he had finished the one on former ministers for magic at 11 o’clock last night) and turned to chapter 3. Soon enough Rose was cheering a victory cheer, as Connor looked despondent and collected what was left of his set into a velvet bag.

“You heard about Alice?” Rose asked Albus, when she was done celebrating her triumph. He nodded. “I wish I’d tried out. I just assumed they’d send first years away, you know?”

“The only position open this year was seeker, anyway, and James was always going to take that.” Scorpius reasoned.

“Whatever.” Rose rolled her eyes at the blonde as he stuck her tongue out at her. The rest laughed at the two’s antics.

“I’m going to go for keeper next year. Thrustion is leaving so that’ll be free.” Scorpius declared confidently.

“So is Appleton. That means that there will be a chaser spot open so I’m going for that.” Rose said. “You should do too, Jude.”

“Nah, I’m good with watching from the stands.” Jude said.

“That reminds me, the first game of the season’s in a month.” Scorpius suddenly remembered.

“Who’s playing?” asked Connor, who seemed to have gotten over his recent chess lose.

“Slytherin vs Ravenclaw!” Rose supplied, excitedly.

“Hopefully you lot will be cheering for us?” Jacob asked the non-Ravenclaws.

“Of course. Anyone but the snakes.” Rose said.

“Don’t generalise about a house, and discriminate against someone based on what house their in.” Albus said, not looking up from his book.

“I’m not!” protested Rose. “Come of it, Al, nobody wants Slytherin to do well. They may not all be dark wizards and stuff anymore, but most of them are still slimy, ambitious-“

“Alright, Rosie, we get it.” Interjected Scorpius, who looked uncomfortable about the insult of the house practically his entire family had been in.

The group returned to talk about lessons, quidditch and other such things school children talked about. Although starting of struggling, Rose, Scorpius and Connor, with Albus’ help, were doing better in their school work and were firmly situated in the middle of most classes, in terms of ability. Jude and Jacob were usually two of the four or five kids at the top of the class, but still a ways of

Albus. Many people, including a couple of teachers, had asked Albus how exactly he was so good, and for once he wasn’t sure on the answer. He supposed it was a mix of natural ability and hard work. That was what Aunt Hermione said was the key. He decided to focus on his book and pushed Aunt Hermione out of his brain.

The conversation around him had turned into the latest prank by Jesus, Fred and James. They had somehow charmed some pink powder to turn anything it touched, also pink. They had set over the marble staircase and when a group of second year Ravenclaws had gone past, the powder had been unceremoniously dumped on them. The teachers hadn’t figured out the counter curse for hours. Albus’ brother, cousin and their friend had been given a month straight detention but the trio, according to Rose, apparently thought that it was worth it, and were still bragging about in the Gryffindor common room.

“They looked like a bunch of flamingos!” Scorpius laughed.

“It was hilarious.” Agreed Rose.

“Let’s just hope they don’t get themselves banned from quidditch. All three are kind of essential if we want to win the quidditch cup.” Jude said.

“There wouldn’t do anything to get themselves banned from quidditch. That’s the only thing they like better than pranks.” Rose reasoned.

“Still they better watch themselves.” Said Scorpius.

“How did you dad take you being in Gryffindor? I forgot to ask.” Jacob said to Scorpius.

“Yeah, you never told us what happened.” Said Connor. Scorpius shrugged.

“Bit surprised, but he was alright with it. I reckon deep down, he knows Gryffindor is the right house for me.”

“What about the fact your friends with me and Albus?” Rose asked.

“I haven’t mentioned that yet… I’m sure he’ll be fine with it. Not that that matters to me.”

“Can’t be worse than the fit Uncle Ron had.” Albus interjected, smiling. Both he and Rose had received a letter from Ron telling them to choose their friends wisely. Aunt Hermione, and his mum and dad, had quickly told them to ignore him.

“He’s coming around. Especially when he found out Scorp was in Gryffindor.” Rose said to Albus.

“What about when he finds out you’re calling him Scorp?” Jacob said and the rest laughed.

***

On October 7th Albus woke up with Jacob, Andrew and Kurt shaking him, rather violently. Albus groaned and rolled over, trying to get back to sleep. The other three were not giving up that easy, however.

“Get up, birthday boy!” He heard Jacob yell and Kurt and Andrew chuckled.

“Why would you do this to me on my birthday?” Albus mumbled.

“Come on, get dressed.” Jacob commanded. After another five or so minutes, Albus finally got up and took a shower. He dressed quickly and followed the other three out of the dormitory and then, the common room, which was nearly empty as it was a Sunday.

“Where are we going?” Albus asked when he saw that they were not heading to the great hall. Jacob simply tapped his nose, knowingly.

They finally reached the seventh floor corridor and Albus noticed a door that he had not seen before. He guessed that it was the room of requirement; he’d heard about it from his parents and read about it. He hadn’t thought about actually looking for it before. Kurt opened it and Albus was surprised at the sight that greeted him.

Inside were his entire family that were at Hogwarts. James, Fred, their friend Jesus and Hufflepuff Louis all had party hats on and exploded magical party poppers in celebration. There was birthday posters and decorations adorned all over the room, giving it a sparkling, colourful look. Roxanne, Lucy and Victoire were standing by a table laden with food and Dominique and Molly immediately rushed to envelope Albus in a hug. Rose, Connor, Jude and Scorpius were also there and they joined in the group hug.

“Happy birthday!” James said to Albus, when the rest had finally pulled back from the hug.

“Why’d you lot do all this?” Albus asked, grinning.

“Can’t we do something nice for our favourite cousin?” Fred asked, teasingly.

“Favourite?” Lucy asked, hurt. She was ignored.

“So you’ll do this for me then?” Rose asked.

“No.” said Victoire, in a monotone. Rose pouted.

“Don’t let Vic get to you, Rosie. She’s missing Teddy.” Louis winked as the rest laughed at her expense.

“Shut up!” Vic said, reddening.

“You can’t tell him to shut up. You’re supposed to be a prefect. Set an example.” James chastised.

“To answer your question, Rosie, we do this for everyone’s first Hogwarts birthday. That one’s always the hardest.” Roxanne told Rose.

“First one without parents.” Lucy added.

“Yeah if we did if for everyone, every year, there’d be a party every other week.” Molly said.

“Come on, party food!” Scorpius called excitedly.

The next few hours were immensely enjoyable. They eat delicious food, opened presents and even played a few party games. In terms of presents Jude got him a large pack of chocolate frogs, James got him pumpkin pasties and virtually everyone else got him books. They knew him so well.

Soon enough, though, it was time to leave. James, Jesus and Fred left for quidditch practice while most of the others needed to get on with homework or prefect duty, in the case of Molly and Victoire. Jacob and Kurt helped Albus haul his large present load to his dormitory, while Andrew went to the great hall for breakfast he’d missed. After dumping a load of books on Albus’ bed, Kurt waved goodbye and headed down to join Andrew.

“Good birthday?” asked Jacob.

“Fantastic.”


	4. Ravenclaw vs Slytherin

On the morning of the Slytherin vs Ravenclaw game Jude and Scorpius walked into the Gryffindor common room from their dormitory. Already many of their housemates were up, which was earlier than usual, especially for a weekend. Jude noticed that while many of their housemates were wearing the Gryffindor red and gold, despite Gryffindor not playing, there was also many people wearing the Ravenclaw colours. Nobody was wearing silver and green. He spotted Rose in a red and gold scarf, talking with her cousins, Lucy and Roxanne. He and Scorpius made their way over to her.

“Hey!” She said, turning to them. “I’m so excited. Our first Hogwarts quiditch game!”

“Same here.” Scorpius said.

“You guys are going to love it! The atmosphere is amazing. Especially when Slytherin plays because practically the entire school is cheering against them.” Roxanne laughed.

“Yeah, it’s great.” Lucy said. “Come on, Roxie let’s head to breakfast.” The two girls waved and exited.

“Jude!” Jude turned to see Callie separate from her friendship group and walk towards him. “You going to the game?”

“Yeah.”

“Cool, it should be a good game. You want to go down with us?”

“I have my own friends, Callie.” Jude rolled his eyes at his sister.

“I know! I was just wondering. Fine, I’ll see you this evening after the game.”

“She’s just looking out for you, you know.” Rose said when Callie left.

“But she is like that all the time. I mean, leave me alone for once.”

“That’s a bit harsh, Jude.” Scorpius said.

“I know… it’s just… ever since our biological mom died Callie’s felt this need to protect me. And it was fine, at first. I guess at the time it was what I needed. But now, I’m old enough to look after myself.”

“I get it, Jude, I do. But look,” Scorpius said, “I’ve always been an only child. When I was a kid I was so lonely. I love my parents, but I always wanted some friend or sibling. Someone to look out for me. Someone to spend time with. Anything. So, perhaps having Callie, even if she is a little over protective, is a good, even great, thing. And it’s definitely better than nothing, like I had.”

Jude didn’t know what to say. He supposed he had been a bit rude to Callie since he’d started Hogwarts. He just wished she treated him like an equal. He definitely hadn’t meant to bring up these feelings in Scorpius and he felt bad he’d been so ungrateful of Callie’s love for him. Especially near Scorpius, who had been deprived of any siblings and even friends until he’d come to Hogwarts. This was largely due to his family’s unfortunate history.

“I’m sorry, Scorpius. I didn’t mean to sound like such a brat.”

“You didn’t sound like a brat.” Scorpius said, with a small smile. “Just thought I‘d say my peace.”

“Thank you.”

“Alright, enough of this deep stuff. We’re going to miss the quidditch!” Typical Rose.

The three friends exited the Gryffindor common room and made their way to the Great Hall. Now that they’d been at the school for a little while, they knew their way around a lot better. In their first weeks they had been late to many lessons, although only Professor Thomas seemed to have cared. They entered the hall and sat down in what had become their usual spot at the end of the Gryffindor table.

During breakfast Rose and Scorpius kept yapping on about the upcoming game, as Jude looked over to the Ravenclaw table. He scanned the mix of faces but he couldn’t spot Jacob or Albus in the mass of blue. He felt a body slide in next to him on the bench and looked to see Connor already reaching for the porridge.

“Morning.” He said.

“Morning.” Jude replied, as Rose and Scorpius greeted their Hufflepuff friend also.

In recent weeks Connor had become somewhat of a regular at both the Ravenclaw and Gryffindor tables. Although he was friendly with his Hufflepuff house mates, his best friends were in other houses. The first few times he had sat down at a table that wasn’t Hufflepuff’s, he’d been told by a Professor to go back to his own table. He would keep coming back over the following days, however and the teachers had ended up just giving up. And so it was that each day Connor chose between sitting with Albus and Jacob, or Rose, Scorpius and Jude. Jude thought that Connor chose the Gryffindor table the most, which he was secretly very glad about.

Jesus, James and Fred, or ‘The Three Idiots’ as some called them, sat down next to them, laughing obnoxiously at some joke Fred had made. Jude liked the three (one was his brother) because they were funny, charismatic and always cheerful but sometimes they were a bit much and could come off as mean, if you didn’t know them.

“Looking forward to the game, little brother?” Jesus ruffled his hair.

“Yes.” He muttered, shoving Jesus off of him.

“Shame your first taste of Hogwarts quidditch, won’t have us in it though.” Fred added.

“Yeah, right Freddie. I heard last year, you fell of your broom against Ravenclaw, and broke a wrist.” Rose playfully punched her dark skinned cousin on the shoulder.

“Rosie!” he said in a mock hurt tone, holding his heart. “How could you hurt me so?” The rest snorted with laughter.

“You lot better be supporting Ravenclaw, over the snakes.” Jesus said.

“Of course we are.” Said Rose.

“What about you, Malfoy? Is this the time you show us your true slimy skin?” James said, eyebrow cocked.

“No, I’m going to wait until your first game. I’ll wave my green flag while you’re throwing up over the side of your broom due to the pressure of your first game and living up to daddy’s expectations.” The rest snorted at James’ expense, including Fred and Jesus. Although at first suspicious of Scorpius, once the Malfoy boy had started joining in with the laddish banter, James had started to accept Scorpius as had the rest of Rose and Albus’ family, even Rose’s father.

“We’re going to head down now. Got to get good seats.” James grabbed a piece of toast and joined the stream of students exiting the great hall for the upcoming quidditch game, and was quickly followed by Jesus and Fred.

“I reckon we should go now to. I don’t want to be stuck at the back.” Connor said.

“Let’s find Jacob and Albus first.” Jude said.

“Speaking of…” Scorpius nodded his head towards the Ravenclaw table, where two figures had stood up and were making their way over to them. When they got closer, Jude and the other three burst into laughter.

Albus and Jacob were dressed in head to toe in blue and bronze. Although not that cold out, they had thick blue woollen hats with the Ravenclaw badge emblazoned on the front, and thick blue and bronze scarfs wrapped around their necks. Their blue jumpers also had the Ravenclaw bird displayed clearly, with its sharp claws wrapped around a broomstick. To top it all off, their faces were covers in blue face paint, with the word Ravenclaw written on their foreheads in bronze over the blue paint.

“Getting in to it, are you?” Scorpius asked between chuckles.

“This is my first ever quidittch game! I want to experience it in the fullest.” Jacob said, excitedly.

“A girl in our year was painting everyone’s faces, so we figured… why not.” Albus said, sheepishly, shrugging.

“Come on let’s go.” Rose said, still laughing.

The group made their way out into the entrance hall, and then to the grounds. The path to the quidditch pitch was clear, as many students tracked their way down along the dirty concrete path, towards the large green pitch with tall stands around it in the distance. Jude could see the Ravenclaw and Slytherin quidditch players zooming around the nearest goalposts, though they were like tiny wasps from this distance. The game wasn’t supposed to start for another half hour, so he assumed that they were just warming up.

The atmosphere of the students was one of great excitement. There was a palpable buzz around the students making their way to the first house game of the year. A couple of Hufflepuff girls in front of them were messing around and shoving each other, laughing. Behind them, a group of Slytherins, who looked to be sixth or seventh years, were enthusiastically chanting, “Slyther-in! Slyther-in!”

Meanwhile, a group of Ravenclaws near them were jeering the Slytherins and booing them. Jacob joined in with them, which the others found hilarious.

Soon enough, they had arrived at the main entrance to the mini stadium. They sat in the Ravenclaw stands like most of the school, and the teachers had to turn one of the Slytherin stands to a Ravenclaw one, when the other Ravenclaw ones became too full. Before long, the players ended their practice and went back into the changing rooms. Suddenly, the loud booming voice of Albus and Rose’s cousin sounded through the spectators.

“Welcome to the first Quidditch game of the season, Ravenclaw vs Slytherin!” Louis Weasley said into his wand, making his voice louder with the sonorous charm. Louis was a very charming guy, perhaps due to the fact that he was part vella. Whatever the case, it also made him a good public speaker.

“This should be an exciting match. These two teams were fighting for second place last year, with Ravenclaw eventually coming second after Gryffindor, who won the quidditch cup. Hufflepuff came in last, with Slytherin in third. This match should tell us a lot about this upcoming season. Can one of these teams mount a challenge to Gryffindor? Can Slytherin recover after losing half their team from last year? Ravenclaw’s team is entirely intact from last year’s so one would imagine they are slight favourites for the game, however when I say slight, I mean slight. Anything could happen.”

“Hey, Louis’s pretty good.” Rose said.

“Yeah, he obviously knows a lot.” said Scorpius.

“Good speaker, too.” said Connor.

“Very charming.” Jacob agreed.

“You should see him around pretty much any girls. They practically fall at his feet, it’s disgusting.” Rose said.

“And now, please welcome the Slytherin team.” Louis’ voice rang out once more. “The same captain, and seeker, from last year Holly Alveraz. This is her last year, I’m sure she’ll want to do well. The keeper, Andi Markowitz and one of the beaters, Fiona Avery, are the other returning members. The new beater’s name is Derrick Delaney, a fourth year. Now, this is the worrying thing for any Slytherin: the chasers. All are new, so it’s a completely fresh line up there, and it will be interesting to see how they work together. There’s the fifth year, Murling and two third years, Edgarson and Lockhart. Apparently they perfomed well in try outs, so perhaps this is the beginning of a glorious three-way partnership.” There were plenty of boos and cheers as the seven Slytherin players made their way on to the pitch and readied their brooms.

“Now, the Ravenclaw team. You may recognize them, they are the same team from last year. The captain and keeper, Axley is followed by the beaters, Emma Cartwright and Kai Chrisp. There are the chasers, Everett, Marley and Goldstein and, finally, the seeker, Samuels. If you remember the game from last year, folks, it all came down between Samuels and Alveraz. The game hung in the balance, as the chasers were evenly matched. Finally Samuels beat Alveraz to the snitch, and Ravenclaw won that game 460-240. Bit of juicy gossip for you, folks, just after that game Alveraz and Samuels stared going out. Hopefully this game won’t ruin their relation-” Louis comment was cut off by Professor Garale, who sat next to Loius, ans said something about not gossiping. The cheers that the Ravenclaw team got were significantly louder than the ones Slytherin had had.

“Madam Friedrechs is just talking to the captains, but now everyone’s ready. And… we’re off!”

Jude had seen quidditch matches before, but not live. It was hard to keep up with the players, who zoomed this way and that, at the speed of at least 80 or 90 miles an hour, at his best guess. They were like bright flies that rocketed around in their colourful quidditch robes. The quaffle changed hands more times than Jude could count in the space of a minute. They flew everywhere: high, low, the stands, the clouds, by the goalposts and more. Luckily, they had decent seats and he didn’t have to crane their necks too much, when the game spread to one of the less reachable areas. He didn’t know how Louis kept up with it all, especially at this speed.

“Murling to Lockhart, tries to pass it back to Murling but ow! That must have hurt! Well placed bludger by Chrisp. Now it’s Marley, who scoops it up. Great move by her to get passed Edgarson, who’s looking like a lost lamb out there. Marley dishes out to Goldstein who, quick as a flash, gives it to Everett, back to Goldstein, to Marley who… scores! 10-0 Ravenclaw!” The blue-clad fans went wild, cheering the first score of the game. Jacob was doing some sort of dance, as Rose, Scorpius and Jude were jumping up and down. Albus and Connor just clapped, Albus did have a large grin on his face, though.

“Markowitz, puts it back into play. Lockhart takes but is quickly dispossessed by Goldstein, who takes it and rushes the Slytherin hoops. It’s one on one! But wait, Delaney’s got clear sight of the Ravenclaw chaser, he swings at the bludger and… misses! That was an easy shot but now Goldstein quickly dispatches the quaffle to the left hoop, going just passed Markowitz’s outstretched fingers. Alveraz will not be happy with her beater and… well pretty much her entire team, so far. The chasers have looked lost, the only beater we’ve seen so far has missed an easy shot, and Markowitz hasn’t gotten close to the goals he’s let in. Slytherin are really on the ropes; Alveraz really needs to revaluate her game plan, here. 20-0 to Ravenclaw.”

By this point the Ravenclaw fans were ecstatic at the start their team had made. The Slytherin fans, on the other hand, were looking appropriately despondent, already thinking that, perhaps, it would be a long day. And indeed it was.

It became increasingly obvious that the new Slytherin chasers were not up to the job. Goldstein, Marley and Everett rang rings around them. It seemed the Ravenclaw beaters, too, were up to task a lot more than the Slytherin ones. They got to the bludgers more often and, on the rare occasions when the Slytherin chases got something going, they shut it down, often rather painfully for Lockhart, Edgarson or Murling. Alveraz was beside herself. She shouted and screamed at her teammates until her voice was hoarse; it did, however, do no good. In the blink of an eye it was 120-10 to in Ravenclaw’s favour.

“Ravenclaw are now 110 points in the lead. This really is turning into a rout, ladies and gents. You could hear a pin drop in the Slytherin stands, right now.” Louis Weasley commented.

The story in the other stands was a different story. Many of the Ravenclaw’s, including Jacob, were dancing and jumping around, enjoying their team’s current demolition of Slytherin. A lot of the Gryffindor’s, including Rose and ‘The Three Idiots’, focused on jeering and insulting the Slytherins in a nearby stand. Most of the Hufflepuff’s, or the less enthusiastic members of Ravenclaw and Gryffindor, including Connor, Jude, Albus and Scorpius, were laughing at the scenes around them, clapping politely and watching the game more intently, rather than letting the occasion get to them.

Just as Jude was watching Jacob do the Macarena dance, the Ravenclaw seeker, Samuels went into a sharp dive. Alveraz was on the other side of the pitch yelling at her keeper and could only watch as Samuels sped towards the ground, at lightning speed. Jude could feel the excitement of hundreds of spectators around him, as they willed the seeker on. Jude was scared Samuels would crash into the ground, but at the last second he pulled up from the dive, the glinting golden snitch in his fingertips.

The stands exploded.

People around Jude were screaming and yelling, Rose and Scorpius were somehow rolling around on the floor laughing at each other, Jacob was pulling Albus in for a hug and Connor was high fiving some stranger in the row in front. Samuels was touching down on the grassy pitch, when Jude next looked up, and he was immediately mobbed by his teammates and pitch invaders, who had run on to the pitch in celebration.

“It’s all over! 270-10 and Ravenclaw have utterly wiped the field with Slytherin! I can’t wait to sneak into Ravenclaw tower to party tonight!” Louis Weasley yelled into his wand.

“Sod-off-Slyther-in! Sod-off-Slyther-in!” was the chant taken up, first by James, Jesus and Fred, and then by more students.

All in all it was a fun first quidditch game.

***

Later that day, Albus experienced his first Hogwarts party. It wasn’t particularly wild, most of the participants were adolescents and it was Ravenclaw, “People need to study in the morning!” It was, however, good fun. Someone had raided the kitchens, and there was all sorts of food laid out on the tables in the Ravenclaw common room. A sixth year brought down a wizard’s wireless and soon enough loud party music was blasting throughout the common room. A group of seventh years had managed to get their hands on a bottle of fire whiskey, from the last Hogsmeade visit. They sat in the far corner, swigging on their prize and fiercely guarding it from anyone.

Jake Samuels was centre of attention, swiping back his wavy, dirty blonde hair away from his eyes as he recounted how he caught the snitch to blushing, giggling girls and awed, open mouthed boys. He was extremely attractive with grey eyes, the perfect amount apart and a straight aquiline nose. His high cheekbones might look too aristocratic, if it weren’t for the accompanying chiselled, muscly, tanned arms that protruded from his open-vested, sleeveless vest.

Albus noticed that Jake didn’t seem to be much enjoying the attention. He kept rushing the story, as if he wished he could finish quickly, then tried to quietly exit, but was stopped by another admirer wanting to hear his story. He was sending desperate, furtive glances to the door and his hand was tapping nervously on his knee, in a random, uneven pattern. He was biting his bottom lip, rather hard and Albus was worried he might make himself bleed.

And then Albus remembered a moment earlier that day, after the match was won. Axley was making some victory speech, to the assembled crowd on the pitch after the initial celebration. A movement of green and blue robes had caught his eye. Lucia Alveraz, the Slytherin captain, was walking away from Jake, who was chasing her. Albus had noticed her eyes were red and puffy, from crying and it looked as though Jake was trying to console her. Suddenly, Jake had been called by the crowd and when he looked back Lucia had been gone.

Remembering that and Louis’ comment from earlier in the day about the two being in a relationship, and now Jake’s odd behaviour; Albus pieced together what had happened. Lucia had been upset over the result of the match, Jake had tried to ease her, but to no avail. Now he wanted to leave to be with his girlfriend and was being unable to thanks to the other Ravenclaws. For some reason Albus made a split second decision and decided to help him. He didn’t particularly know why. Jesus, he should really be a Hufflepuff.

He told Kurt, Andrew and Jacob that he was going for a walk and, promptly left before they could ask why. He made his way down the staircase to the bottom, where there was a stone ledge with a few comfy, plush yellow pillows on it. He sat down and waited about ten minutes. Nobody passed him, for which he was grateful. Why was a first year sitting alone doing absolutely nothing, on a weekend?

He made his way back up to the door, where the bronze knocker asked him, “What can travel around the world, while staying in a corner?” He thought for a moment.

“A… stamp?” The door swung open to reveal the ongoing party, he had left ten minutes prior. He saw Jake surrounded by a gaggling group of fifth years. He looked completely lost.

Albus hesitated, then resolutely strolled over to the group. “Excuse, me?” They all looked at him, the fifth years in annoyance, Jake in curiosity.

“Yeah?” asked Jake.

“I’ve been sent by Professor Flitwick, to escort you to his office.” Something like relief flashed through Jake’s eyes, but the group around him looked disappointed.

“Maybe he wants to congratulate you and give you a gift.” Said one of the fifth years.

“He is the Head of Ravenclaw.” Another one added.

“Right! Professor Flitwick. Lead the way! Sorry, everybody.” He pushed Albus towards the door and the two hurried to the exit, leaving a grumbling group behind them.

“Thank god!” Jake breathed once they had left the common room. “Right, anyway thanks for the message but I know the way to old Flitwick’s office.” He turned to leave but Albus stopped him.

“Wait! Flitwick didn’t send me.”

“What?”

“Er…” He suddenly became unsure of himself. What if Jake told him that he was an idiot, that he didn’t need his help? Jake was now looking at him with great suspicion, and Albus was starting to

regret this plan. Too late now. “Well I sort of… I don’t know saw that you obviously didn’t want to be there, and I saw you and Lucia Alveraz earlier, so I thought that I’d make up that excuse so that you could go and talk to her.” He winced. That made him sound like a bit of a creep.

“Why would you help me?” Jake asked, obviously confused.

“I don’t know… should have been in Hufflepuff, I guess.” Jake laughed at that.

“Well thankyou…”

“Albus.”

“Oh Harry Potter’s kid. Well thank you, Albus Potter. I am in your debt. Wow, that sounds dramatic. Anyway, thank you again, now I better go comfort an upset girlfriend.” He nodded at Albus and rushed down the stairs, taking them two at a time.

“Well that’s my good deed done for the day.” Albus mumbled to himself, then realised that he was talking to himself and was probably descending into madness. 


End file.
